Yaounde Central Hospital : Serenity Reigns As Patients Undergo Treatment

Friday, March 6, 2020. The time is 4:00 pm. It is about seven hours after the Minister of public Health officially announced the confirmation of a case of corona virus (COVID-19) patient in Cameroon and barely an hour before the official revelation of a second case. However, serenity reigns at the Yaounde Central Hospital where both patients have been quarantined and placed for appropriate treatment at the solitary care centre, some 500 metres away from the main buildings that harbour the hospital.
While moving around the hospital premises, Cameroon Tribune observed that there is no sign of panicking. Patients and the hospital staff are going about their usual duties. Some hospital staff could be seen wheeling patients from one end of the hospital to another. Others could be seen either taking care of patients or attending to those who have come for external consultation. The administration of the hospital is on hand to intensify hygiene and sanitation security methods that had been put in place at the hospital since December 2019, when the outbreak of the disease was announced in Wuhan, China. 
The Director of the Yaounde Central Hospital, Professor Joseph Fouda, who was just from presiding at a meeting on hygiene and sanitation as well as how to increase the security of hospital staff in handling such patients, with much reluctance told Cameroon Tribune that there is nothing to worry about especially as the hospital had put in place a series of measures to protect the medical team, the patient’s entourage and the eventual handling of any suspected or infected case. With the current situation of two cases of COVID 19 patients, the Yaounde Central Hospital is carrying on with it activities unperturbed.  At the door of the isolation unit a poster signed by the Director of the hospital reads: “Staff On Duty Only”. Those entering the room are fully masked from their head to toe to avoid any infection or contact with the virus. Professor Engene Sobngwi of the Yaounde Cent...